THERE are few people who can claim to have a day named after them but for Welsh grandmother Helena Jones, today is her day.

THERE are few people who can claim to have a day named after them but for Welsh grandmother Helena Jones, today is her day.

But this is no sycophantic exercise in self-appreciation or a chance to commemorate achievements of the past - today is about giving others the chance of life.

The 70-year-old is spearheading a campaign to increase the number of people on the NHS Organ Donor Register after seeing four of her five children suffer kidney failure.

And today 20 registration points will be set up across the country to encourage people to pledge their organs to others in the event of their death.

Helena's Hope Day will be the largest ever organ donation appeal in Wales.

Mrs Jones's aim is to see the number of people on the organ donor register in Wales jump from the current 19% to 50%.

"There are 400 people waiting for a kidney transplant alone in Wales," said Mrs Jones, who lives in Glynneath. "My son and daughter are among that number.

"But with just over 50 kidney transplants carried out in Wales every year my children are going to be waiting up to 10 years at this rate.

"We have the doctors and the surgeons but we haven't got the organs."

Mrs Jones launched the Helena's Hope campaign last year just months after her second son Wayne, 39, had undergone a kidney transplant.

Her eldest son Robert, 41, received a new kidney eight years ago after suffering kidney failure. Her youngest son Richard, 36, and eldest daughter Helen, 35, are both on dialysis waiting for a transplant after also suffering kidney failure.

Mrs Jones's youngest daughter Cathryn, 28, is so far free of the hereditary condition but must undergo annual tests.

Richard, who lives in Neath Abbey, said, "It's frustrating as if there was a kidney available I could have the operation now but there's such a shortage, hence why Mum's started this campaign.

"A lot of people just sit there and moan about their lot and the hand of cards they've been dealt but Mum has got up and done something about it.

"This is not just a token gesture as she has really made a difference, people have signed up.

"It is a long road for me and it's not going to happen overnight but a least something is happening."

The organ donation programme in Wales has seen fewer organs available for transplant in recent years, not least because of the adverse effect the Alder Hey scandal had.

But families not being aware of their loved one's wishes or being asked to make a decision about whether organs should be donated immediately after death has contributed to the shortage as has a lack of intensive care beds that has resulted in potentially suitable donors not having access to the clinical conditions necessary for donation, said the University of Wales's lead clinician in transplant surgery Argiris Asderakis.

"Many families who have donated organs say it is the only good thing to come out of death," he said. "It is something positive they can carry home with them."

But it is not just kidney patients who stand to benefit from an increase in the pool of potential organ donors as there are currently 21 people in Wales waiting for kidney and pancreas, heart and lung and liver transplants.

Janet Pardue-Wood, director of the National Kidney Re-search Fund in Wales, said, "People don't realise that carrying a donor card isn't always enough to guarantee that their wishes will be carried out.

"Just talking to your family about becoming a donor, signing the register is a vital part of the process and, at this largest ever co-ordinated sign-up, we are hopeful that people will respond."

And Dr John Marsden, chairman of the Welsh Kidney Patients Association, said, "We must try and increase the number of patients who receive donor kidneys because, in the long term, it makes good economic sense.

"But not only that, the health of the patient is vastly improved and they have far more freedom because they are no longer tied to dialysis.

"Any initiative that will increase the potential pool of donors is fully supported."